


Sword-Keeper

by Merfilly



Category: Sword-Dancer Saga - Jennifer Roberson
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, POV First Person, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:28:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27454255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: A look at the opening ofSword-Breakerfrom Del's perspective.
Relationships: Delilah/Tiger (Sword-Dancer)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Sword-Keeper

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Griddlebone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Griddlebone/gifts).



> Griddlebone, you had fascinating prompts. I opted to tackle the first six chapters of this one because I always felt like the culmination here is when Del really realized that she and Tiger just ARE.

Sleep broke earlier than I would have liked, but what was one to do when Tiger was paying for his bad choices?

I was willing to concede the kick to the head was far more the horse's fault than his own, but he was the one that had chosen to drink on top of the injury. Clearing my head of such trivial concerns, I started prodding Tiger along. How had this man survived before me? He rarely managed anything approaching healthy choices.

Then again, did I actually get to critique that? I'd tried to give him up to take back my daughter, all because my plan to win back my brother had failed.

I'd used him, put him in far greater danger than he'd ever known, without ever giving him enough information to make his choice honestly.

What did we now face, hounded by religious zealots, and Tiger with a _jivatma_ that would sooner see us all dead than obey his call? It was possessed and thirsting, something I did not know that Tiger could ever fully understand. Not that I really did either, but Chosa Dei was decidedly the biggest part of our problem in my eyes.

I did, at last, get him up on the horse that was more foul-tempered than anything I'd met before, so that we could resume our flight… even if we had no clear goal beyond dealing with the possessed sword.

It might yet work out, even if Tiger was delusional enough to believe he was some mythical deliverer of the Southron people now.

* * *

He'd said my brother spoke. I weighed that once again as I gathered provisions, certain he'd be wasting whatever coin he had bartering for _aqivi_ and drinking some besides. Maybe, impossibly, he'd turn up something approaching information about the zealots behind us.

Jamail had deserved a far better life. When I left him to the security he'd carved for himself, I had felt empty of all purpose. The Vashni chieftain had cared for him, despite all he had been through. He had been willing to speak to me, a woman, about what had actually happened. He had been willing even to let Jamail leave with me.

I had made my choice, and freed him, though it took away everything I was, to choose to be there.

Someone shouted about a woman with a sword, and I knew we needed to be moving on, that I needed to go get Tiger before his love of _aqivi_ got the better of us both.

We had a cursed _jivatma_ to take to a sorcerer that was as mythical as the one possessing it, a fair number of the tribes of the Punja wanting our — my — blood, and a trail of tanzeers with grudges by this point.

Worrying over Jamail's fate was only going to leave me incapable of finding him again, of learning what had happened, how it had, and why.

* * *

Tiger hated the ritual.

I didn't care.

We had, generally, been at odds on personal levels throughout my quest. Now the quest was his, but he was dithering around the edges, refusing to commit fully even though he had thought the very idea of what was needed.

To deal with Chosa Dei, we had to have Shaka Obre.

I sang the words, I entreated the gods, I asked through _Boreal_ 's kiss of frost — and it settled me more than I thought it would be able to, despite having chosen to do it.

Tiger was still unsettled.

I still didn't care.

Only, I did, as I told him of what I'd done, before settling to see to cleaning the blade. Tiger, likewise, made to clean his… and managed to cut himself on the draw.

That should not even be possible. Not for a sword-dancer like him, clumsy as he sometimes came across as.

Tiger was willing to set it aside as an accident, though I believed this to be one more piece of him attempting to shield me.

 _Hoolies_ , but some day he was going to have to actually grasp that I was a sword-dancer, a sword-singer even, before I was merely a woman.

* * *

Rhashad had given us far too much to worry about. Abbu was not to be trifled with, if he chose to enlist as Sabra's sword-dancer. And then _Samiel_ had attempted to take Tiger's foot. Lying low until the zealots forgot about their supposed Messiah dying by my blade was going to be difficult when Sabra had obviously managed to secure her power over Julah.

She had coin in plenty, which would only sweeten the deal for so many sword-dancers that would prefer I not exist, or wanted the prestige of defeating Tiger.

We had enemies in every direction, had no idea where we were supposed to go to find Shakra Obre, and we were down to riding just the stud. It dawned on me that experienced trackers would not follow Rhashad's tricks; the stud's prints, where they managed to hold sway, were deep now, while my roan would not be showing the weight of a rider.

Worries for another day, even as I wondered if Rhashad was truly the friend he seemed to be.

* * *

Tiger could be rude, but this… this was different.

He stripped down and took the cursed _jivatma_ out, much like I would take _Boreal_ for ritual.

I kept my blade close, and stripped down when I realized he had begun working magic around his. How could I trust this? Tiger was a **sword-dancer** , not a wizard or djinn or loki-demon.

The power grew, all around us.

Fear rose. I'd touched his sword, I'd felt what Chosa Dei wanted from me specifically. I knew without doubt that if Tiger failed in whatever he began, it would not be Tiger in the body ahead of me.

I held _Boreal_ ready, eyes fastened on the tableaux of Tiger, _Samiel_ , and the storm of heat swirling sand into glass.

How many times would I face this man, a man that I had found and changed, with death in the air?

And why did it matter so much to me, that I would actually weep for him?


End file.
